News

Saturday, May 01, 2010

(Photo by Sandy Palmatter) ADRIAN - The Calvin softball team closed out its 2010 campaign on a high note, upsetting regionally-ranked Adrian to gain a doubleheader split in its regular season finale. Calvin upset the host Bulldogs 2-1 in the opener of a doubleheader Saturday and then fought valiently before falling 4-3 in game two. With the split, Calvin moved up into a tie for sixth place in the final MIAA standings at 6-10 in league play. Calvin’s conference finish was an improvement of two spots from a year ago while its conference win total was an improvement of six wins from its 2009 league campaign. At 11-24 overall, Calvin also upped its final season win total by seven over its 2009 win total.

Of Calvin’s six conference wins this spring, two were against teams heading to the four-team MIAA Tournament next week as the Knights not only defeated second place Adrian (12-4 MIAA) but also third place Trine (11-5 MIAA). Calvin also nearly knocked off league champion Alma (14-2 MIAA) in its MIAA season opener before falling 4-3 after leading early in a contest played back on March 31.

In Saturday’s game one win, Calvin rode the right arm of freshman Shelby Mast (Hudsonville/Hudsonville HS) and the powerful bat of junior Sass VanRooyen (Beamsville, ON/Smithville District Christian HS) as Mast struck out seven batters and walked just one in seven innings of work while VanRooyen smacked her second home run of the spring - a solo shot in the top of the sixth - that gave Calvin a 2-1 lead. Adrian (27-9 overall) took a 1-0 lead with an unearned run in the bottom of the first but Calvin came back to tie the game in the third on a hit and two Adrian errors. VanRooyen then led off the sixth with a homer to left-center that put the Knights on top. Adrian later placed the tying run on second base in the bottom of the sixth and seventh innings but Mast (10-18) was able to bear down and extinguish the scoring threat each time.

Calvin had five hits in the win including two off the bat of freshman Aubree Thompson (Grand Rapids/Grand Rapids Christian HS).

In game two, Adrian scored two runs in the second and two more in the sixth to build a 4-0 lead. Calvin struck back with three runs in the bottom of the sixth as VanRooyen drove in sophomore Kim VandenAkker (Grand Rapids/Grand Rapids Christian HS) with an RBI single and sophomore Marie Prins (Hudsonville/Unity Christian HS) and senior Mandy Johnson (Grand Rapids/Northpointe Christian HS) drive in runs on groundouts.

In the seventh, Calvin was retired in order to end the Calvin comeback bid.

Johnson (1-6) took the loss with Mast tossing five innings of relief.

VanRooyen finished the season with a six-game hitting streak and a .379 season average. Prins finished the season with a seven-game hit streak and team-lead .380 batting average.

Mast finished the season with 168 strikeouts in 189 innings of work. Her strikeout and innings pitched totals were the most by a Calvin pitcher since Shauna Koolhaas amassed more than 200 strikeouts and 200 innings pitched during the 1998 season.

In conference play, Mast also finished with an MIAA-leading 76 strikeouts and 88.1 innings pitched.